


Convalescence (The One Where Bucky Starts Reading Manga)

by Ann_Drist



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Anxious Steve, Blood, Canon Divergent, Coffee, Comfort, Feelings, Fluff, Food, Gen, Manga, Prosthetics, Stream of Consciousness-ish, Takes place after CATWS, There is a bookstore coffee shop scene but this is NOT a coffee shop AU okay, VA Therapist Sam, What if Bucky had downtime with his friends after getting helped out by Shuri, What if Steve and Sam found Bucky before CACW (and things turned out differently), recovering bucky, recovering from trauma
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-05-31
Updated: 2018-06-15
Packaged: 2018-07-11 08:36:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,439
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7041079
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ann_Drist/pseuds/Ann_Drist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The one where Bucky Barnes reads comics, colors coloring books, and gives a card to Natasha.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Greetings, readers. All 4 of you or whatever. It has been a solid two years since I started this fic. I think seeing Bucky come back in CA:CW kinda cooled my drive for writing this, because Bucky was super-busy doing everything BUT recover in CA:CW, and then he got froze, and we didn't see him again til Black Panther. So the timeline for this fic doesn't super-matter? But it imagines him having downtime in DC with Steve and Sam, while he is in the process of recovering from being a Brainwashed Assassin Freezy Pop. 
> 
> After CA:CW ppl were very "oh no, Bucky!" and wanting nice fanfic about him. (Just like after CA:TWS.) And now 2 years later, after Black Panther and Infinity War, here we are again. 
> 
> So, come for the comfort-food fic of Bucky getting to have time to be a person (not a murder-machine, or a superhero). And don't worry about the timeline. Let's pretend he got unfroze in Wakanda, helped out by Shuri, and then got to have like off time with Sam and Steve. Yeah. That sounds nice.

Bucky stares listlessly at the wall. He’s sitting up in bed, wrapped up in blankets. His head feels heavy. He keeps nodding off and startling awake again.

There’s a soft knock on the door. It’s Steve.

He’s going to go meet Sam for coffee, and does Bucky want to come along.

Bucky doesn’t feel up to it. He also doesn’t feel up to staying in the apartment and moping. Thinking about Steve and Sam laughing and joking together would make just staying in unbearable. 

“…lemme go shower.”

He can’t remember the last time he did that. And that’s no good, he has to go out and act like people. 

He pulls his wet hair into a ponytail and digs around for something clean and not-pajamas. He needs a hoodie and a glove, too.

There’s a coffee shop inside the bookstore. That’s where they meet Sam. 

He’s already sitting at a table with a drink in front of him. He raises a hand, smiles easily. 

“Figured I’d get us a table. Busier than I thought in here”

“We should go order.”

Bucky sits down heavily, diagonally from Sam. 

Steve brushes his knuckles against his right arm. Bucky looks over sharply. He wills his nerves to calm down. Steve isn’t a threat. 

“You know what you want?” he asks.

Bucky shrugs. 

“How ’bout I surprise you with something?” 

Infinitesimal nod. 

Steve squeezes his right shoulder and leaves to get in line.

Bucky hunches, lets the hoodie fall over his head a bit more. 

It’s soft and it’s thick. It muffles the sounds of the bustling coffee shop and reduces visual input. Good. 

Sam sits across from him, body language relaxed and easy, and sips his drink.

Sam is Steve’s friend. Steve trusts him with his life. The guy had travelled around for a year with Steve, helping him look for Bucky. Now that they’d found him, Sam was helping Steve with … this. Whatever this was. 

Bucky knows that’s more of a testament to how Sam would do anything for Steve, rather than personal interest on Bucky’s behalf. 

The first time he’d met him, it was a big fight. Not that Bucky remembered it. Just flashes, disjointed images. But he knew that Sam had swooped in out of the air to keep him from killing Steve. 

So, he didn’t blame Sam for being less than welcoming. 

But when the guy wasn’t being The Falcon, he worked at the VA helping people like him.

Well.

Maybe not exactly like him. 

But as close as it got. 

There was a reason Sam didn’t try to fill the silence with empty chatter when Steve wasn’t around. Bucky appreciated the quiet, the lack of any social expectations whatsoever. Because god knows he couldn’t meet them. 

Sam knew what it meant when Bucky jerked in alarm, startled at a loud noise, flinched when the lights flickered.

It was great.

It was also terrible.

 

Steve comes back with a vanilla latte for himself, and something called a caramel macchiato for Bucky. 

He takes a sip. It’s too sweet, but it’s something new to try. And the paper cup feels good in his flesh-and-blood hand. 

He cradles it and listens to the ebb and flow of Steve and Sam’s jokes and laughter. They’re quick and witty. He can hardly follow the conversation, let alone contribute anything to it. Bucky feels slow and dull-witted by comparison. By any standard, really. 

They don’t seem to expect him to join in, which is a relief, but it also makes him feel disconnected. Their conversation is starting to bleed in to the other voices of the other patrons. There’s something with a drumbeat playing in the background, baristas are loudly announcing the names of customers, and there’s the shriek of steaming milk—Bucky stands up.

Sam and Steve pause mid-laugh, look up at him. 

“I’m gonna go look around.”

He steps away from the coffee shop area, plunges into an aisle. 

It’s less crowded here. The books lining the shelves muffle the sound. 

It’s peaceful. Bucky lets his hood fall back. 

He wanders around the bookstore. Pacing in the muffled quiet is relaxing. He starts looking over the books with something that's almost interest. 

There’s section of paperbacks that are a little narrower and taller than most of the others. He looks closer. They’re different serial stories, collected together. There have cartoon illustrations on their spines.

Bucky stops and stares. 

One of the illustrations is a metal arm.

Its fist is clenched. Raised in the air in either triumph or defiance. 

There’s broken circuitry on the inner forearm. 

He grabs the book impulsively. 

Bucky flips it around, checking out the front and back covers. 

There’s a larger illustration of a bloodied-up blond guy, young. The metal arm from that small illustration was probably his, but on the cover image it’s been ripped off. There are loose wires and cables. Metal closed up over the stump. Trickles of blood on metal, skin, scar tissue.

The metal prosthesis was for his right arm, not his left like Bucky. The fingers weren’t quite as articulated. It didn’t look as flashy silver-bright as Bucky’s. But those were minor differences. He’d never seen anybody else with a metal arm. Ever. 

Bucky takes a closer look at the guy’s face. Looks like he’s just been in a fight that gave him hell, but he’s happy about it. Bucky gets a nagging, almost-memory of Steve. 

He knows Steve used to be like this. 

Bucky looks at the spine again. 27. He puts it back on the shelf and pulls out volume 1 of the series. It's a bit awkward to flip through it with a glove on one hand, but he manages. He can’t figure out how to read it, though. The speech bubbles don’t make sense.

There's a note on the back that says it's printed right-to-left for some reason. 

Bucky thumbs through it. Backwards, since that's how you're supposed to do it, he guesses. 

He scans the pictures, not reading the words.

He feels a soft touch at the small of his back, a soft "hey" from behind him. Bucky goes still. Reminds himself not to react. It’s just Steve checking up on him.

Bucky held the book up in his gloved hand, hiding the spine and the illustration on the cover.

"Think I wanna get this.”

Steve is mildly, pleasantly surprised. 

"Okay, yeah sure." They head to the register. "What's it about?”

"Dunno. Gotta read it and find out."


	2. Chapter 2

Bucky’s sprawled on his bed, reading the comic book. His face stretches into a bitter grin. So the main character guy has special powers, and the military wants to put them to use? Pretty realistic for sci-fi/fantasy. 

He turns the page. His tongue presses against the roof of his mouth, and an explosive burst of air comes out from his lips. He wasn’t expecting it to be funny, but this main character, Ed, was too much. Ranting about how he wasn’t really _that_ short—how dare people call him short, didn’t they know that was rude. 

Bucky’s shoulders were shaking. He felt a nagging tug of nostalgia, another almost-memory of Steve. 

 

Bucky reads the whole thing. It actually holds his attention, which is a nice surprise. Most of the time he loses interest in things. 

It’s slow going at first, reading left-to-right. Bucky will stop and re-read panels a few times, not used to reading in this direction. 

 

Steve is up before him. 

He’s heated up some water in the electric kettle for his French press coffee.

Bucky shuffles over and grabs the herbal tea that his therapist won’t shut up about. 

“Morning.”

“Morning.”

Bucky throws the sachet in and pours water on top. 

“You think Sam’ll be free…for coffee again?” 

Steve’s eyebrows jump up. He tries to play it cool. “Yeah, uh, I can ask him. When did you wanna go?” 

Bucky shrugged. “When you guys’re free. S’not like I’m busy.” 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Talk therapy is like a mission report. Except he hasn’t been given a mission with a clear objective, so he doesn’t know what his therapist want to hear. 

Mission reports were easy. His handlers wanted facts. 

The therapist wants him to verbalize his thoughts and feelings. 

If he knew what the hell he was thinking and feeling, he’d be glad to tell her. 

Bucky always shrank in his chair. That was something his handlers never wanted. Personal details, his take on things. 

Talking about things that didn’t relate to the mission was a sign to his handlers that he needed to be wiped again. 

Bucky wishes he knew what the therapist wants to hear from him, so he could just say it. Without floundering around in the dark and saying things that caused her lips to go in a straight line, not frowning, and make a note on a clipboard.

People making notes on clipboards about him has never been a good thing.

But he’s read two volumes of Fullmetal Alchemist by his next appointment, and maybe he can talk about that.

 

“So, you’ve been reading—a comic series?”

“Yes.”

“What’s it about?”

Bucky considers.

“War. Medical experiments. Children enlisted in the military. Genocide.”

“I thought it was supposed to be light reading! A teen comic series.

“It is, it’s really funny.” 

Awkward silence.

Pen scratches as she makes a note, keeping her face carefully neutral.

A sick feeling spreads in Bucky’s stomach.

He blows his cheeks out in a sigh and stares at his feet. 

He didn’t even get to tell her about Ed’s metal arm. But if he tells her now, she’s just going to carefully not-frown again and make another note. 

He misses Nat and Steve. They understand dark humor, the need to crack jokes far sooner than anyone else deems appropriate. 

The therapist asks Bucky more questions, tries to prompt a response, but he can’t bring himself to say anything. 

 

 

 

 

The Black Widow—Natasha is over at the apartment when Bucky comes back from his appointment that went south. 

He collapses on the armchair. Steve rushes off to get him tea.

Bucky can feel that he’s doing nothing to keep his misery and defeat His body language must be practically telegraphing his mental state to an operative like her.

She blew on her coffee and looked over the edge of the mug at him. “Tell people you used to be a brainwashed assassin, and all of a sudden everyone says you need therapy.”

Bucky looked at her. 

“’S’what I keep sayin, I don’t get what the big deal is.” 

Her mouth quirked up more, corners of her eyes crinkling a bit. The gnawing pit of despair and hopelessness in Bucky’s chest eased a little.

 

 

 

Sam comes over later. Bucky can hear him join Steve in the living room. 

He could join them, but he’s in the middle of re-reading volume 1. 

He hears his name and goes still.

“You think talk therapy’s the best choice for him?”

“He needs help, Sam.”

“No, I’m just saying—dude’s not the most talkative guy. And being cooped up in a room where he’s just supposed to talk for almost an hour—I just wanna be sure the guy doesn’t feel like he’s stuck in a debriefing. Or an interrogation.” 

Bucky hears Steve sit heavily on the couch. “Oh god. Oh, god, how did I not think of that. Shit. _Shit._ ” 

“It’s okay. Let me talk to some people.” 


	3. Chapter 3

Bucky tags along to the coffee shop with Steve again to meet Sam. 

Sits down cross-legged in the manga section to read volume three. Can’t wait until checkout, he wants to read it _now._

Huh. So Ed’s got an automail tech who services his prosthetics

Spunky. Likes clobbering him with a wrench. 

That fuck-with-my-tech-and-you’ll-won’t-live-to-regret-it attitude reminds him of Shuri. 

Though at least she doesn’t beat the meat parts of his body with wrenches and spanners.

Just the metal parts. 

Bucky read a few more pages.

Yeah, he’s lucky to have Shuri as his tech instead of Winry. Christ. 

Not to mention that Shuri’s tech makes automail look about a hundred years old.

 

By the time Steve comes to find him, Bucky’s read the whole book. He grabs volume four of the shelf, too, and walks over to the checkout. 

 

 

Next week when he goes to therapy, the appointment’s in a different room. There’s a round table with a big bowl of fruit in the middle. The table also holds a stack of thick textured paper and a box of something called chalk pastels. 

Bucky’s confused. There’s a woman there but she’s not his usual therapist. Bucky tries not to panic. Is this because he wouldn’t talk for most of his last session?

The new person asks if he’ll take a seat at the table. Bucky doesn’t want to until he knows what’s going on.

“She not want to see me anymore?”

Confusion for a moment, then her face cleared. “No. Mr. Wilson suggested you be given the opportunity for some different approaches to therapy.”

“It was Sam’s idea?”

“Yes.” 

Bucky sits down. Looks up at the new therapist for instruction. 

 

“I don’t gotta talk?” 

“You may if you'd like to, but that’s not the main purpose of this activity.” 

Bucky applies the chalk pastel to the paper again. It’s smooth and creamy. It flows against the paper without much resistance. 

“Never got much to say.” 

“Well, that’s fine in here.” 

Bucky’s chest feels a little less tight. He scribbles the sticks of color against the paper, selecting different ones as he forms shapes that roughly represent the fruit in the bowl. 

The therapist sits next to him, talks out loud about how she draws the shadows under the fruits. She’s not facing him as she talks. She’s just drawing, facing the bowl of fruit, not him. 

Bucky looks over her shoulder and listens. Copies her color combinations. 

Near the end of the session, she asks if she can see his work. Bucky nods. She compliments his use of color, asks if he’s done anything like this before. 

Bucky shakes his head but finds himself saying, “Steve used to do stuff like this.” As he says it, he remembers, a bit. 

“How did you like today’s session?” 

Bucky shrugs. He wants to ask if he did all right, but casts around for another question instead. “What do you do with the fruit after?” 

That gets a smile. She’s going to use it again for other clients, but Bucky can take one piece if he likes. 

He pockets a tangerine. 

“Is this something you’d want to do again next week?” 

Bucky thought about it. “I like plums.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bucky/plums forever OTP

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to lurkeriatipsos for the beta read and editorial input. All mistakes are my own. 
> 
> Normally I don't like writing in present tense, but this is third-person limited from Bucky's POV while he's still in a very reactive state, so it just felt right. 
> 
> Shout-out to all the readers who know what manga series Bucky is reading! If you don't know, don't worry, the title comes up in the next chapter. 
> 
> More characters coming up in the next chapter, too.


End file.
